Official Trailer For Upcoming Netflix Original Series, Political Thriller ‘House Of Cards’ (VIDEO)

We’ve been reporting to you for the better part of two years on the upcoming Netflix original series, House of Cards, based on the 1990 BBC miniseries of the same title and we finally have a trailer to show you and it certainly looks intense.  House of Cards, produced by David Fincher and starring Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright, came to our intention last year as the first announced original programming for the streaming home video giant.  Netflix outbid several other cable networks, including HBO and AMC, in a deal worth a reported $100 million for 26 episodes of this new series.

All 13 episodes of season one will be available on Netflix streaming on Febraury 1, 2013.

NETFLIX ALERT! Original Series ‘ House Of Cards’ Premiere Date Announced, More Details

If you’ve been following news about Netflix you know about House of Cards, the first original series that Netflix announced that they would be producing as a Netflix original program.  From Director David Fincher and starring A-listers Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright, to call this American reboot of the 1990 BBC miniseries highly-anticipated would be an understatement.  Well, the wait is almost over as Netflix has announced that the series would hit their streaming service on February 1, 2013 and as was done with Lilyhammer, the entire first season (all 13 episodes) would be available immediately to watch.  See the press release below for more details.

Via Press Release:

The Netflix original series, from Media Rights Capital, “House of Cards,” starring Academy Award ® winner Kevin Spacey (“Horrible Bosses,” “American Beauty”), Golden Globe ® nominee Robin Wright (“The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,” “Forrest Gump”) and Kate Mara (“American Horror Story”) will be available for members to watch instantly beginning February 1, 2013 .

All 13-episodes of the drama series’s first season will be available to Netflix members in territories where Netflix is available – North America, the UK, Ireland, Latin America and Scandinavia.

“‘House of Cards’ combines the best of filmmaking with the best of television. Beau Willimon’s compelling narrative, David Fincher’s unparalleled craftsmanship, indelible performances by Kevin Spacey and the rest of the cast unite to create a gripping story and new kind of viewing experience for Netflix members,” said Ted Sarandos, Chief Content Officer, Netflix. “In offering the entire season at once, Netflix is giving viewers complete control over how and when they watch the show.”

From director David Fincher (“The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,” “The Social Network”), award-winning playwright and Academy Award® nominated screenwriter Beau Willimon (“Farragut North,” “The Ides of March”) and Academy Award® winner Eric Roth (“Forrest Gump,” “Munich”), “House of Cards” is based on the BBC miniseries of the same name. This wicked political drama slithers beneath the curtain and through the back halls of greed, sex, love and corruption in modern Washington D.C.

An uncompromising exploration of power, ambition and the American way, the series orbits Francis Underwood (Spacey), the House Majority Whip. Underwood is the politician’s politician – masterful, beguiling, charismatic and ruthless. He and his equally ambitious wife Claire (Wright) stop at nothing to ensure their ascendancy. In addition to Spacey, Wright and Mara, the series also stars Corey Stoll (“Midnight in Paris”), Kristen Connolly (“The Cabin in the Woods”), Michael Kelly (“The Adjustment Bureau”) and Sakina Jaffrey (“Definitely Maybe”).

Fincher directed the first two episodes of the series, which were written by Willimon. James Foley (“Glengarry Glen Ross”), Joel Schumacher (“Falling Down”), Charles McDougall (“The Good Wife”), Carl Franklin (“Devil in a Blue Dress”) and Alan Coulter (“The Sopranos”) also serve as directors on “House of Cards.”

The drama’s second season is due to begin production in spring 2013.

House of Cards is executive produced by Fincher, Willimon, Joshua Donen, Eric Roth, Kevin Spacey, Dana Brunetti, Andrew Davies, Michael Dobbs and John Melfi. The one-hour drama is produced by Donen/Fincher/Roth and Trigger Street Productions, Inc. in association with Media Rights Capital for Netflix.

About Netflix:

With more than 27 million streaming members in the United States, Canada, Latin America, the United Kingdom and Ireland, Netflix, Inc. (NASDAQ: NFLX) is the world’s leading internet subscription service for enjoying movies and TV programs. For one low monthly price, Netflix members can instantly watch movies and TV programs streamed over the internet to PCs, Macs and TVs. Among the large and expanding base of devices streaming from Netflix are the Microsoft Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii and Sony PS3 consoles; an array of Blu-ray disc players, internet-connected TVs, home theatre systems, digital video recorders and internet video players; Apple iPhone, iPad and iPod touch, as well as Apple TV and Google TV. In all, more than 800 devices that stream from Netflix are available. For additional information, visit http://www.netflix.com. Netflix’s upcoming original series include the political drama “House of Cards,” which stars Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright; the fourth season of the critically acclaimed comedy “Arrested Development;” “Hemlock Grove,” Eli Roth’s murder mystery series based on Brian McGreevy’s gripping novel of the same name; Jenji Kohan’s series “Orange is the New Black,” which stars Taylor Schilling, Laura Prepon and Jason Biggs; and the second season of “Lilyhammer,” which stars Steven Van Zandt. Follow Netflix on Facebook and Twitter.

REVIEW: Rampart (Film – Millenium Entertainment, 2012)

Nothing fascinates like a dirty cop. In real life they’re terrifying, but in the movies their upending of law and order can open deep explorations of psychology, morality and violence. So meet Dave Brown, Brown is a cop long ago unleashed from the rules of the Los Angeles Police Department. Roving the streets in his black-and-white cruiser, he governs and punishes at will. His home life is a riddle. Somehow he has fathered children with two sisters. Somehow he still lives casually with them both, slipping in and out of a family life that’s as tangled as his long career on the force. His own daughter calls him Date Rape. That’s because, years ago, Brown may have killed a rapist and gotten away with it. The shadow of the incident still haunts him, so when his Rampart division gets caught up in a corruption scandal, Brown makes an easy target. As the controversy seeps through the department and into city hall, this hardened, reckless officer finds himself at the center of a sordid L.A. story.  – Millennium Entertainment

30 out of 100

When we first heard about Rampart, we were very excited to say the least.  The Los Angeles Police Department has a long and storied history as rich and full as any major police department in the country and we’d even go so far that its history, along with its Hollywood backdrop, provides for a narrative more compelling than even that of New York or Chicago.  Throughout the history of cinema, no other police department has been so thoroughly documented on film, both fictionally and factually.  Rampart was supposed to bring audiences yet another fictional telling of the mythology surrounding the Rampart Division scandal that rocked the department in the late 1990’s.  The most recent and easily recognizable version of this story unfolded on the critically acclaimed F/X drama The Shield for six seasons.  Mix all of this in with an all-star cast that includes Woody Harrelson, Robin Wright, Ned Beatty, Steve Buscemi, Anne Heche, Cynthia Nixon, Ice Cube, and Ben Foster, Rampart became our most anticipated film of 2012.

The reality is, though, that despite these factors, this isn’t really a film, it’s a character study… and a bad one at that… and we feel scammed.

Don’t get us wrong, all of the performances in and of themselves in this film are fantastic, but with the exclusion of Harrelson’s Brown, they are all little more than cameo appearances because other than the fact that most of the cast has very limited screen time, the development of the characters and their back-stories is so limited that the audience cannot relate or attach to any of them.  Even as good and compelling as Harrelson is as Brown, he’s no Vic Mackey. Mackey was an anti-hero in every sense of the word from the first episode of The Shield and you knew immediately that you weren’t supposed to root for him but you did it anyway and you hated yourself for it.  There is none of that with Brown because the film never really explains to you anything in-depth about the character to get an understanding of his motivation so you really don’t know how you’re supposed to feel about him. They hint at a lot but the dialogue is written with so little exposition that it seems as if the writers felt the audience should just know the entire history of these characters before they started watching the film or else it’s their owned damned fault for missing production meetings or something.

The fact is that there are just too many different weakly written characters in this film with small parts that pick away at screen time that should be allocated to Harrelson and with all of these bit parts crammed into the 107 minute run-time, there is literally no room for any kind of discernible plot and that is why this film fails so miserably.  We still don’t know what the story is.  There was one point in the film where it seemed hopeful that there might be some semblance of a plot emerging involving a hinted-at conspiracy to set up Brown as a scapegoat for the whole department to take the public’s attention off of the actual Rampart scandal, but that quickly faded without resolution just like every other event in this film.  And that’s what the film is:  a series of unresolved events packed with poorly developed characters portrayed by an excellent cast to distract the audience from recognizing how poorly written this film actually is.